Padre
Pio famous Italian saintly priest who bore the stigmata, or wounds of Christ.
(Padre Pio died in 1968.)
He possessed the gifts of celestial perfume, bilocation, healing, prophecy,
tongues and reading of hearts.
Considered by many as the greatest mystic of the 20th Century.

As
Seen on EWTN
A JPN Production
by award winning British film director Award Winning Film Director J. Paddy Nolan

PADRE
PIO
- ST. PIO of PIETRELCINAPadre
Pio famous Italian saintly priest who bore the stigmata, or wounds of Christ.
(Padre Pio died in 1968.)
He possessed the gifts of celestial perfume, bilocation, healing, prophecy,
tongues and reading of hearts.
Considered by many as the greatest mystic of the 20th Century.

CANONIZATION
OF ST. PIO OF PIETRELCINA CAPUCHIN PRIEST
Known as Padre Pio

ADDRESS
OF JOHN PAUL II

Monday,
17 June 2002

Dear
Brothers and Sisters, 1. It is a great joy for me to meet you again the day
after the solemn canonization of the humble Capuchin of San Giovanni Rotondo.
Dear pilgrims and devotees, I greet you with affection who have gathered in
Rome in such large numbers for this special occasion. I first of all greet the
bishops, priests and religious who are present here. I want to pay special attention
to the Capuchin Franciscans who in communion with the whole Church praise and
thank the Lord for the marvels he has worked in their exemplary confrere. Padre
Pio is an authentic model of spirituality and humanity, two characteristic features
of the Franciscan and Capuchin tradition. I greet the members of the "Padre
Pio Prayer Groups" and the representatives of the family of the "Home
for the Relief of Suffering", that great institution for the treatment
and the care of the sick that came forth from the new saint's charity. I embrace
you, dear pilgrims from the noble land that gave birth to Padre Pio, from the
other regions of Italy and from every part of the world. By your presence here,
you witness to how widespread are devotion to and confidence in the holy Friar
of the Gargano in the Church and on every continent. 2. But what is the secret
of such great admiration and love for this new saint? He is first of all a "friar
of the people", a traditional characteristic of the Capuchins. He is also
a saint who is a miraculous healer, as the extraordinary events which are part
of his life attest. However, above all Padre Pio is a religious who is deeply
in love with the crucified Christ. He even shared physically in the mystery
of the Cross during his life. He liked to link the glory of Tabor with the mystery
of the Passion, as we read in one of his letters: "Before exclaiming with
St Peter "Oh how good it is to be here', it is necessary first to climb
Calvary, where one sees only death, nails, thorns, suffering, extraordinary
shadows, abandonment and fainting" (Epistolario III, p. 287). Padre Pio
made his journey of demanding spiritual ascesis in communion with the Church.
The temporary misunderstandings he had with one or other ecclesial authority
did not put a brake on his attitude of filial obedience. Padre Pio was a faithful
and courageous son of the Church and in this situation following the shining
example of the "Poverello" of Assisi. 3. May this holy Capuchin to
whom so many people turn to from every corner of the earth point out to us the
means to reach holiness which is the goal of our life as Christians. How many
faithful in every social condition, from the most diverse places and the most
difficult situations hurried to ask his help! He knew how to offer them all
what they needed most, which they were often groping for without being fully
aware of it. He passed on to them the comforting and enlightening Word of God,
enabling each person to draw from the sources of his grace through his diligent
dedication to the ministry of the confessional and the fervent celebration of
the Eucharist. So it was that he wrote to one of his spiritual daughters: "Do
not be afraid to come to the Lord's altar to be fed with fleshoftheImmaculateLamb,because
no one will better reconcile your spirit than your king, nothing will warm it
more than his sun, and nothing will soothe it better than his balm" (ibid.,
p. 944). 4. The Mass of Padre Pio! It was an eloquent reminder to priests of
the beauty of the priestly vocation. For the religious and the lay people who
flocked to San Giovanni Rotondo even at the early morning hours, it was an extraordinary
catechesis on the value and importance of the Eucharistic sacrifice. Holy Mass
was the heart and the source of his whole spirituality: "There is in the
Mass", he used to say, "the whole of Calvary". The faithful who
crowded round his altar were profoundly impressed by the intensity of his "immersion"
in the Mystery, and perceived that "the Father" participated in his
person in the Redeemer's sufferings. 5. St Pio of Pietrelcina presented himself
to everyone - priests, men and women religious and lay people - as a credible
witness to Christ and to his Gospel. May his example and intercession spur everyone
to greater love for God and concrete solidarity with his neighbour, especially
those who are in greatest need. May the Blessed Virgin Mary, whom Padre Pio
called by the beautiful name of "Our Lady of Grace" (Santa Maria delle
Grazie), help us to follow in the footprints of this religious who is so beloved
by the people! With this hope, I cordially bless you who are present here, your
loved ones and all who are committed to following in the spiritual footsteps
of the beloved saint of Pietrelcina.

Ephesians
5: 25-27. Husbands, love your wives, as Christ also loved the church and delivered
himself up for it: that he might sanctify it, cleansing it by the laver of water
in the word of life: that he might present it to himself, a glorious church,
not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that it should be holy and
without blemish.

"He
will call together the whole people to himself, out of every country of the
Dispersion, making them his own, as though they were his own children, and promising
to restore their country and establish again their kingdom and nation, in order
that he may be worshipped by them as God." (St. Hippolytus)

In
a 1980 interview for the German magazine Stimme des Glaubens published in October
1981, John Paul II was asked explicitly to speak about the third secret. He
said:"Because of the seriousness
of its contents, in order not to encourage the world wide power of Communism
to carry out certain coups, my predecessors in the chair of Peter have diplomatically
preferred to withhold its publication. On the other hand, it should be sufficient
for all Christians to know this much: if there is a message in which it is said
that the oceans will flood entire sections of the earth; that, from one moment
to the other, millions of people will perish... there is no longer any point
in really wanting to publish this secret message. Many want to know merely out
of curiosity, or because of their taste for sensationalism, but they forget
that 'to know' implies for them a responsibility. It is dangerous to want to
satisfy one's curiosity only, if one is convinced that we can do nothing against
a catastrophe that has been predicted." He held up his
rosary and stated "Here is the remedy against this evil. Pray, pray and
ask for nothing else. Put everything in the hands of the Mother of God."
Asked what would happen in the Church, he said: "We must be prepared to
undergo great trials in the not-too-distant future; trials that will require
us to be ready to give up even our lives, and a total gift of self to Christ
and for Christ. Through your prayers and mine, it is possible to alleviate this
tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because it is only in
this way that the Church can be effectively renewed. How many times, indeed,
has the renewal of the Church been effected in blood? This time, again, it will
not be otherwise. We must be strong, we must prepare ourselves, we must entrust
ourselves to Christ and to His holy Mother, and we must be attentive, very attentive,
to the prayer of the Rosary.

Lúcia
herself is reported to have explicitly stated that the Third Secret contains
Apocalyptic content. According to one source, when Lúcia was asked about
the Third Secret, she said it was "in the
Gospels and in the Apocalypse", and at one point she had
even specified Apocalypse chapters 8 to 13, a range that includes Apocalypse
12:4, the chapter and verse cited by Pope John Paul II in his homily in Fatima
on 13 May 2000.

A
news article quoted former Philippine ambassador to the Vatican, Howard Dee,
as saying that Cardinal Ratzinger
had personally confirmed to him that the messages
of Akita and Fatima are "essentially the same."

A
TERRIBLE WARNING - THE MESSAGE OF OUR LADY OF AKITA, JAPAN: The third message
on October 13, 1973, the actual anniversary of the final visions and miracle
of Fatima is as follows: "As I told you, if men do
not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment
on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one
will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a
great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests
nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will
envy the dead. The only arms which will remain for you will be the Rosary and
the Sign left by my Son. Each day, recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the
Rosary, pray for the Pope, the bishops and the priests. The work of the devil
will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals
opposing cardinals, and bishops against other bishops. The priests who venerate
me will be scorned and opposed by their Confreres. The Church and altars will
be vandalized. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the
demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of
the Lord.

From
Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in Vatican

Text
of The Third Secret of Fatima:

COMPLETE
TRANSLATION OF ORIGINAL TEXT

VATICAN
CITY, JUN 26, 2000 (VIS) - Given below is the complete translation of the original
Portuguese text of the third part of the secret of Fatima, revealed to the three
shepherd children at Cova da Iria-Fatima on July 13, 1917, and committed to
paper by Sr. Lucia on January 3, 1944:

"I
write in obedience to you, my God, who command me to do so through his Excellency
the Bishop of Leiria and through your Most Holy Mother and mine.

"After
the two parts which I have already explained, at the left of Our Lady and a
little above, we saw an Angel with a flaming sword in his left hand; flashing,
it gave out flames that looked as though they would set the world on fire; but
they died out in contact with the splendor that Our Lady radiated towards him
from her right hand: pointing to the earth with his right hand, the Angel cried
out in a loud voice: 'Penance, Penance, Penance!'. And we saw in an immense
light that is God: 'something similar to how people appear in a mirror when
they pass in front of it' a Bishop dressed in White 'we had the impression that
it was the Holy Father'. Other Bishops, Priests, men and women Religious going
up a steep mountain, at the top of which there was a big Cross of rough-hewn
trunks as of a cork-tree with the bark; before reaching there the Holy Father
passed through a big city half in ruins and half trembling with halting step,
afflicted with pain and sorrow, he prayed for the souls of the corpses he met
on his way; having reached the top of the mountain, on his knees at the foot
of the big Cross he was killed by a group of soldiers who fired bullets and
arrows at him, and in the same way there died one after another the other Bishops,
Priests, men and women Religious, and various lay people of different ranks
and positions. Beneath the two arms of the Cross there were two Angels each
with a crystal aspersorium in his hand, in which they gathered up the blood
of the Martyrs and with it sprinkled the souls that were making their way to
God."

.../THIRD
SECRET/... VIS 000626 (380)

Johannes
Friede (1204-1257)

When
the great time will come, in which mankind will face its last, hard trial, it
will be foreshadowed by striking changes in nature. The alteration between cold
and heat will become more intensive, storms will have more catastrophic effects,
earthquakes will destroy great regions, and the seas will overflow many lowlands.
Not all of it will be the result of natural causes, but mankind will penetrate
into the bowels of the earth and will reach into the clouds, gambling with its
own existence. Before the powers of destruction will succeed in their design,
the universe will be thrown into disorder, and the age of iron will plunge into
nothingness.
When nights will be filled with more intensive cold and days with heat, a new
life will begin in nature. The heat means radiation from the earth, the cold
the waning light of the sun. Only a few years more and you will become aware
that sunlight has grown perceptibly weaker. When even your artificial light
will cease to give service, the great event in the heavens will be near.